


Death, Love, Duty

by shelovestoship



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Gen, Jon Snow Knows Nothing, Jon Snow is a Stark, jonsa, season 8 alternate ending, season 8 how it should have gone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 16:18:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18898240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shelovestoship/pseuds/shelovestoship
Summary: SPOILERS for 8x06Had to write this. Because that was just a godawful ending.Afterwards, he walked. And walked. No one stopped him. No one knew she was dead - not yet.





	Death, Love, Duty

**Author's Note:**

> Not really Jonsa but kind of implied / open to.  
> I don't know what this is really. I hated almost everything in the past few eps, but the Jon getting arrested thing just bothered me so freaking much. I just don't get what stopped him from just walking out and away from King's Landing. No one knew Dany was dead. Out of all the problems with the plot overall, this one just seems beyond stupid. If Grey Worm and the Unsullied had shown up right as the dragon was flying off or something okay, but they didn't. So yeah. Urg. Jon should have gone back to Winterfell to be with the Starks. The pack survives and all that.  
> Plus I hated that they used the whole Love is the Death of Duty when Jon / Dany was the worst love story in the history of love stories. I mean seriously.  
> I also don't know why the last paragraph is in present tense. That's just how it came out.

Afterwards, he walked. And walked. No one stopped him. No one knew she was dead, all they had seen, if they had seen anything, was her dragon fly off.

Perhaps they believed her to be riding him.

Flying another victory lap over the city of ashes. A city she had claimed she'd saved. Jon knew she hadn't as much as he had wanted to believe in her, love her.

Love was the death of duty.

Duty was the death of love.

Had he loved her?

Could he have killed her if he had?

He hadn't been able to kill Ygritte all those years ago. Then again, she hadn't just burnt a city full of innocent people, all in the name of saving them.

* * *

 

The ashes floated down around him, like snow, but not. It was eerily quiet. Like just after a snowfall. But this held none of the beauty of the snow of his childhood, of the north.

This was the quiet of death and fear.

* * *

 

"What happened?" Arya's voice cut in. As quick as a cat and as silent too, she'd found him again, snuck up on him.

"The Queen is dead," he said and kept walking.

"Good."

She didn't ask questions. They just walked. Maybe, they could keep going. All the way back to Winterfell.

Was it there he belonged? He didn't know.

It was the only place he had ever wanted to belong. Where he might have had a chance. Ned Stark's son.

Not anymore.

He still wanted it though.

Love was the death of duty.

Duty was the death of love.

Death was the love of duty.

He smiled. All muddled up. His brain felt slow too. Like he hadn't slept in weeks. Had he? He'd put his head down and closed his eyes every night, but had he really rested. Could he rest now?

_You know nothing Jon Snow._

You know nothing.

* * *

 

"Sansa will be happy to see you," Arya said. It was the next day. Or the day after. They must know what he had done by now. Would there be another war? Should he disappeared, fade away into a whisper, a legend?

“I can’t go to Winterfell.”

“Of course you can,” she told him. “It’s your home.” She nodded towards a nice group of trees. "The sun is setting, we should make camp here."

“It’ll only cause trouble,” he tried arguing.

“You’re not a criminal Jon.” She looked him straight in the eyes. “You’re a hero. You did what no one else could or would. You probably save a lot of people. And you did it by killing the woman you loved. It’s tragic but beautiful. That’s the story the world will remember.”

They’re quiet for a long time and only an hour later as they’re laying down to sleep does he speak again. “I don’t think I did. Love her.”

“That doesn't matter,” she said. “Only the story matters.”

Jon Snow wondered if his story was to be that of  Queenslayer, kinslayer. He’s never been a hero, he’s not one now. But he’d like to be. Even if he can’t quite believe in the stories the way he used to as a child. 

* * *

He still hasn't decided if going to Winterfell is the right choice when he sees it on the horizon. Not even when he enters the great hall. The northern lords have just named Sansa their Queen. She embraces him like she always does and then, only then, does he know it was the right choice. That he is a Stark and Winterfell his home. Sansa and Arya too. Even Bran, as strange as he was now. 

Even when Arya leaves, to see what is West of Westeros, she’s still part of them.

They are Winterfell.

It’s their love and their duty and will be so even in death, as their statues stand watch over the generations to come.

*****

*****

*****

**The End?**

**The Beginning?**


End file.
